Posts by Frosty840

Windows 8: A soaraway Kinect? Or is it Red Ink Friday for Microsoft?

You're comparing the release of Kinect, an entertainment hardware device, with the release of an operating system? Are you high?

Kickstarter kindly allows Brits to channel 95% of their money through it

Correction

" If projects don't reach their funding target, the money goes back to the folks who offered it and the site doesn't get a fee"

They money's not taken until the funding goal is met. It never "goes back" because it never went anywhere.

Ho ho ho! Apple's Samsung ban bid pushed back to Christmas

"Sammy"

Just a point, Sammy are actually Sega's parent/holding company.

Microsoft plots entry into tablet trade

Good for them

Now they might actually have a platform that *wants* their new operating system, 'cause there's bugger-all of us in the desktop world that seem at all keen...

US officials confirm Stuxnet was a joint US-Israeli op

Typo

Second paragraph, first line typo of "Stuxnet" as "student", I believe.

America, China go ape for tablets

More like we've all been burned before...

I don't even get excited over the "next big thing" anymore, because I know it'll depend on a service which doesn't exist outside of the US, or is in copyright limbo outside of the US, or which the pan-European language -splosion makes uneconomical to develop.

Whatever the next big thing is, I already know we're not getting a copy.

China aims its most powerful rocket ever AT THE MOON

Re: Thank goodness the bankrupt UK

To be fair, we did only stop giving them development aid in 2011, according to various news sources...

Microsoft mulls touchscreen controller for next-gen Xbox

Anyone else ever thrown a controller in frustration?

I mean, I've only thrown mine into the couch, but I know a fair few people who regard their controllers as disposable things to be thrown at the wall when the situation warrants.

That's a bit of a big ask for something that's got to contain at least mobile phone's worth of hardware...

Nintendo said to be readying replacement for 3DS

Only themselves to blame

Given Nintendo's track record with handhelds, of late, with the rubbish DS, the brilliant DS-lite, the pointles DSi, and the superior DSi XL revision, I would consider myself an idiot if I bought a 3DS before discovering what their second-gen hardware would change.

Most Adobe Reader installs are out of date

Yes, but...

That's only because Adobe brings out a new version of their damnable within the time it takes for you to download and install the update to the last version.

Yell and Microsoft ink SMB deal

SMB?

I've seen this term used quite a bit, lately. I can only assume it means "small and medium business".

Can anyone confirm this?

Asus Eee Pad Slider

Android version locking?

It's vaguely implied in the review that this product will allow pain-free upgrading to newer versions of Android, as opposed to the typical horror of Andoid-phone-style version locking.

Can you confirm that, one way or the other?

Samsung SH-B123 internal 12x BD-Rom drive

Screenshot WTF?

With the Private Ryan image, you're taking an image where the left half of the shot is unfocused, and then asking us to make some kind of comparison between the standard-res, UNFOCUSED left and the upscaled IN-FOCUS right?

What is this bullshit?

Gifts for the Geeks

Great timing

Yup, December 22nd is the perfect time to be posting articles on christmas gifts, most of which are available only online, or which will be sold out in stores, in the middle of the worst post-affecting weather I can remember. Classy timing, here. Very clever.

E-book reader demand boom near

Libraries

It doesn't matter to me how low-priced, or how high-quality ebook readers become; if they can't balance their pricing with the fact that I currently get most of my books from the local library, then there's no further conversation to be had.

A purchased book is a luxury item, with value over and above the ability to just read the damn thing. Until ebooks themselves are priced down to the cost of a trip to and from the library, then I'm not interested.

No wonder CompSci grads are unemployed

Not much has improved since my day, then

I did my secondary schooling in the late 1990s, and was so utterly put off IT by my teachers (and by the woeful syllabus they had to teach against) that I didn't actually do my CS degree until five years later, having basically dropped off the map during that time.

The first year of my CS degree was similarly dismal; being taught what integers were, and how to perform boolean evaluations, and the like.

There seems to be a (not inaccurate) assumption within the university system that, unlike any other subject I know of (except for Art, which requires a foundation year), their first-year students will know NOTHING AT ALL about their chosen subject.

You wouldn't just walk into a university one day and ask if they had any places available on a Chemistry degree course, and yet that is exactly what I did when starting my CS degree. I just walked in, they checked for empty places, and signed me up on the spot.

When I asked what I'd need to know before starting, they explained to me that there wasn't any requirement beyond basic reading and writing skills (and some UCAS points, I suppose). This is a problem that starts in schools at the (utterly, utterly woeful) ICT GCSE level. It wastes university resources, and valuable time that students should be spending at the end of their degrees on advanced subjects.

O2 Broadband puts brakes on BitTorrent

Spread the downloads through the day

One of the things that annoys me about the whole "If everyone tried to download a movie every evening, then in the evenings, nobody will be able to do anything online" argument is that all it would take to fix the problem would be a remote-download device, i.e. just enough electronics to remotely log in, configure and start a download, and store it.

You could build them into routers (which most people leave on, even if they turn off their PCs during the day), and have either internal memory or a USB port for a memory stick (or two, for network printers :p )

That way, people could log in to them at any time of day, start downloading, and thus spread traffic load more evenly through the day.

Odds are that someone already has a patent on this, and that's why it's not already happening...

Eurocrat demands MP3 player volume limit mandate

What about really quiet files?

Are they planning to mandate that the player must scan the entire track before playing, then reset the maximum volume to prevent a damaging peak? Would this affect the volume of the whole track, or just the loud section?

And what about really quiet files where one needs to turn the volume up to its hissing, crackling highest in order to hear anything at all? You've all listened to one of those podcasts once or twice, I'm sure...

Definite health benefits aside, I fear that this idea is rather on the unworkable side...

Vodafone has head stuck in Smoke

Fight!

I'd quite like to see a "duel" between two corporate offices, whether that be between the buildings themselves or just between office workers.

One suspects a "dual-location HQ" would be much less interesting.